32 Killer Rules for Prosodic Accentuation or The process of Falling Accent in Prosody

In the previous article, entitled Prosody: Guide for the Beginners, I made you acquainted with a few essential prosodic terms,their true meaning, usage, and roles as far
as scanning a verse is concerned with some easy-going examples. Today I am
going to discuss with you a crucial topic – some general rules of accentuation
in verse.

Well, I think you have some decent ideas about what
accent is and what role it plays in versification. If it’s not clear yet, no
matter let’s put one or two words again. Generally accent is akin to Latin ‘ictus’ and signifies that a
particular syllable is to receive a blow by which it is rendered prominent and
loud. It helps the particular syllable to stand out from the other syllables.

Accents are four kinds:

1. Word Accent: - It denotes the normal or accepted placing of stress
on the syllable of a word.

Example: BEAU-ti-ful

2. Rhetorical Accent:- It denotes the placing of stress on the entire
word in a sentence to impart an unusual shade of meaning to it.

Examples:

The person is poor but HONEST.

If we utter the expression – “He is rich but
honest” in the normal way, it will express nothing more than what it actually
means, But if we put an accent on the conjunction “but”, then the utterance
will insinuate the actually the rich are dishonest by nature, so he being both
rich and honest, is an exception.

3. Metrical Accent:- It is an accent used in poetry, which is a kind of
metrical composition. Accents indicates a stress that falls on
syllables, however important it may be, according to the demands of the metre.

Examples:IN a/ BAT-tle

My HAIR/ is GREY

4. Wrenched Accent:- It is an alliteration of the normal word accent
enforced by the metrical accent. As for examples, “depend” or
“desire” has the accent on the second syllable. If we have to put the accent on
the first syllable instead of the second, then it is called wrenched accent.

Examples:

far coun-tree

fair
la-die

To
be frank there is no definite rule where accent will fall. Such as in a-fter, a-bout,
af-ter-noon accents falls on the first, second and third syllable respectively.
Despite this inconsistency, it is possible to find certain regular features
about accentuation.

Before
explaining all the general rules let me add one more vital point by which one
can master the process of accentuation in prosody. It’s simply through building
your recitation technique up with proper modulation of voice, exact intonation
using high and low rhythm. In order to find out accented syllables one is to
read carefully and note what syllables require the greater effort to pronounce
them. Such syllables, it is needless to say are accented, as they can be
distinguished from the rest according to their nature, importance and position
in a metre.

General Rules of
Falling Accent

NOTE: Accented
syllables are capitalised.

·Accent falls on important or root
syllables.

oe.g. LOVE-ly, TRY-ing

·Accent falls on the important words. A
important word draws more attention, it is natural that the stress is laid on
them.

·Accent falls on the alternate syllables.
When the first syllable is accented, the next one is generally found unaccented
and vice versa.

e.g.
The RAIN/-bow COMES/and GOES

·In
the case of Mono-syllabic word, accent depends on the nature and position of
the word. If the word is an important one, accent according to Rule No. 2.
Falls on it. Again if the word comes after an accented syllable, it generally
becomes unaccented in accordance with rule Rule No. 3.

e.g.
IN a/ MAZE

LOST
I/ GAZE

In
this case ‘maze’ and ‘gaze’ are two important mono-syllabic words and hence
accented. But in the following line –

MU-sic/ WHEN soft/ VOI-ces/DIES

Just
take a look on the word ‘soft’. It seems it is an important word. Just because
it comes after an accented syllable, the word remains unaccented for the sake
of metrical clarity.

·Di-syllabic
words take one accent only. The stress may either fall on the first syllable or
the second syllable. About 80% or so of two-syllable words get their stress on
the first syllable. There are of course, exceptions to this rule, but very few
nouns and adjectives get stress on their second syllable. Verbs and
prepositions usually get stress placed on the second syllable, but there are
exceptions to this too.

e.g.a-SIDE be-TWEEN

·But the disyllabic words like
“any”, “many”, and “very” sometimes may remain
unaccented, whereas the monosyllabic words like “yet”, “still” and “all” are accented very often.

e.g.
DARK-ness, CUR-few, be-LIEVE, ap-PEAR
etc.

·There are
a few disyllabic words which are even accented on the first syllable, no matter
whether they are used as nouns or verbs.

Examples:- 'RES-cure(n.v.); JIN-gle(n.v.);
BUS-tle(n.v.);

MAT-ter(n.v.); HUR-ry(n.v.) HUN-ger(n.v)
etc.

·When the word is of tri-syllabic, accent
is laid on one syllable which may be the first, second, third syllable. Here
one has to identify the root syllable for accentuation.

·In the matter of tetra/ penta/ or hexa
syllables accent falls on the alternate syllables. In
general case, either the first or the second syllable must have the accent.

·Very few exceptional words like “returnee” have the
first two syllables unaccented, followed by the accent on the third (re-turn-EE).
In fact, the English tendency is to
put the accent as near the beginning of the word as possible.

·In a
polysyllabic word having no prefix or suffix (eg. DE-TERIO-rate, CHLO-RO-form”,
HI-PPO-crene” etc) we may have two accents. Here the more emphatic accent is called ‘primary accent’
and the less emphatic accent is “secondary accent”. But the secondary accent
more often falls on the non-roots.

·Reflexive
pronouns show that the action
affects the person who performs the action. For example: I hit myself.

The second syllable usually takes the stress.

Examples:

1.My-SELF

2.Them-SELVES

3.Our-SELVES

·If the
number is a multiple of ten, the stress is placed on the first syllable.

Examples:

1.TEN

2.FIFty

3.ONE-hundred

·Two vowels
together in the last syllable of a word often indicate an accented last
syllable.

Examples: com-PLAIN, con-CEAL

·When
there are two like consonant letters within a word, the syllable before the
double consonants is usually accented.

Examples: be-GIN-ner, LET-ter

·The
combining forms or prefixes having two syllables (eg. “hyper”, “inter-“,
“super-“, “hypo-“, etc.) have the accent always on the first syllable.

·The force
of the accent is so strong that while it retains the integrity of that syllable
on which it falls, the unaccented syllables run the risk of disappearing
altogether. This is shown in the following process:

a.Apheresis: the dropping of an unaccented
syllable or sound from the beginning of a word, as in spite for despite, spital
for hospitaletc, varsity for university etc. A variant of Apheresisis Aphesis
in which the gradual loss of a short or unaccented vowel at the beginning of a
word takes place, as in mend for amend, cute for acute, special for especial
etc.

b.Synocope: the
dropping of the middle syllable, as in empress for emperess damsel for damosel,
e’er for ever, o’er for over, ta’en for taken etc.

c.Apocope: the
dropping of the last syllable or letter as in cinema for cinematography, curio
for curious, eve for evening etc.

I can sum
up suggesting that if one wants to achieve expertise as far as accentuation is
concerned his or
her good companion is a good dictionary. Dictionaries are great tools for
learning word stress. Besides one can take the help of SMARTPHONE DICTIONARY APP
featuring Audio facility.

Dear readers, if you have any further information regarding this topic please inform
me in the comment box bellow.

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Mr. Somnath Sarkar is currently discharging his new job responsibility as an Administrative & Accounts Officer in Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR), Govt. of India. Earlier he served as a Guest Lecturer of English in Seva Bharati College. Besides being a passionate blogger he has expertise in Search Engine Optimization and Web Designing. He is currently maintaining two following websites: